I'd be careful looking right into your partner's eyes. They can use that to psych you out, and you might miss seeing some openings. I prefer to scan a triangular area from each shoulder to their chin/nose. I find that helps me read them better, see more openings and react faster to anything they might throw at me.
Haha, I've noticed this, especially every time I spar with someone that is better than me I can get psyched out a bit when they look straight back into my eyes Would you say that you don't focus in on anything in particular and just try to have an overview of the triangle area you are mentioning?
Look straight down the barrel. From 6.05. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbNMcSxX7M4"]Sparring Drills - YouTube[/ame]
Yeah, I suppose you could say I have an overview of that area. I scan that area for openings, and incoming attacks and "tells". I try keep my eyes moving until either they attack or I do.
I think most important thing for beginner in combat is defense with footwork. If you have good movement you can get out of the bad situations. Beside footwork, you add things like parry, slipping, then combine it together. What does your coach say? Very basic but maybe this? [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhSZ_sCKKjY"]Basic Boxing 2 Footwork - YouTube[/ame]
Try to learn a good basic strike like a jab or teep that way if someone is coming at you, you can resort to these and use them as counters and move off. But in you're defence if you're fairly new and the people you're sparring with are more experienced they should go easier on you until you're comfortable IMO. My friend recently started trainin with my club and grasped the teep straight away and no one can get close to him in sparring unless he wana to engage with them.